


Don't Try to Dunk Someone in a Bathtub

by marreena



Series: non omnis moriar [5]
Category: Dragon Age - All Media Types, Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: Bathtub Cuddling, F/M, Fluff
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-12-02
Updated: 2015-12-02
Packaged: 2018-05-04 12:31:58
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,410
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5334209
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/marreena/pseuds/marreena
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Lady Inquisitor,</p>
<p>     Many of the visiting nobles—well actually many people of Skyhold in general are complaining of a distinct smell in the tavern. I believe everyone is quite aware of the source, especially after your past dragon hunting trip to Crestwood. I assume you will deal with the problem promptly.</p>
<p>Thank you, Josephine</p>
            </blockquote>





	Don't Try to Dunk Someone in a Bathtub

**Author's Note:**

> u know that crestwood smell is nasty
> 
> also fair warning - they're naked and talk about titties but nothing more than that

There’s three letters of complaint on her desk—which isn’t unusual at all. Many night she arrives up at her quarters with a stack that will take her hours to read through and address. Most of the letters from nobles or dignitaries visiting, complaining that they were not properly accommodated—even though she knows Josephine definitely did perfectly accommodate their outlandish needs—or that they were not getting enough one-on-one with the Inquisitor herself. Some of the letters are even from members of her own rank, complaining of trivial issues that someone thought was important enough for her to read. 

It’s not that she doesn’t like reading words from her own charges, it’s just time consuming replying to a soldier's complaints about the hole in the Commander’s roof for the third time that month. 

However, this night the complaints are all centered around something much more personal and are all from members of her inner circle: Josephine, Dorian, and Vivienne. 

_Lady Inquisitor,_

_Many of the visiting nobles—well actually many people of Skyhold in general are complaining of a distinct smell in the tavern. I believe everyone is quite aware of the source, especially after your past dragon hunting trip to Crestwood. I assume you will deal with the problem promptly._

_Thank you, Josephine_

_Ariala, Deal with your cow boyfriend I can’t taste my wine over his smell. Dorian._

_Dear, use this gift well. Vivienne._

She gazes over her shoulder and suddenly the massive tub and assortment of soaps make a lot more sense. 

Ariala laughs to herself and walks to the tub, and as soon as she gets within arms reach a rune in it starts glowing. When she puts her hand in the water near it, she can feel the warmth— _oh_ , Vivienne is amazing. She quickly goes back to her desk to write out a quick note for Bull to meet her in her room when he was done with whatever he was currently doing, and sends Vivienne a quick thank you. 

A plan is already formed in mind as she goes around the room and blows out some of the candles, grabs some wine—a Rivaini spice, a favorite of both her and Bull—from her stash, and strips, carefully placing her necklace on her desk. The water is a perfect temperature that it almost is too hot and soothes all of her muscles quickly when she slips into the massive tub. A small moan slips from her lips as she runs her own hands over skin and massages her aching body. 

Before she gets too lost in the bath she reaches for one of the oils and pours a good amount into the tub; the deep scent of spice and hint of floral fills the room.

She has to dip her head a couple times to get her hair fully wet and she brushes it back out of her face—her hair slicked out of her face is a welcome change to the wet frizz it was at Crestwood. Humidity is slowly becoming the enemy she never knew she had. Never has her hair curled like that before so it’s a welcome joy having her hair finally smoothed again. She blames her mother for this. 

Time seems to melt with the heat of the water, the smell of the oils, and the couple glasses of wine clouding her senses until she recognizes the unmistakable steps coming up her stairs. She shifts a bit, trying to shake off the daze that she’s been in—also shifts a bit so she looks absolutely irresistible. 

The steps stop and she waits, lets him take her in. Lets him take in the scene that she carefully crafted. 

She can’t fight the smile on her face when she hears his belt drop to the ground and opens one eye to peak. He’s skipped a couple steps in getting undressed; his harness and shoes are still on but his pants are around his knees. Even through all of his struggling, he keeps his eye on her. 

She sluggishly moves in the tub and crosses her arms on the side of it and rests her chin on her arms. “Need any help, Bull?” she asks with just a bit of a drawl. She drops her hand to find her wine glass on the side and takes a sip, both the alcohol and spice burn down her throat. 

Bull just manages to take off his boots and stumbles towards the bath, kicking his pants off. She laughs and rises from the bath, enjoying how his eyes slip down her body watching the water run off. “Let me,” she murmurs and reaches to undo his shoulder brace. Her finger nimbly work at the buckles and she ignores his hot gaze and wandering hands. 

“This is all a ploy to get me to bathe, isn’t it?” he asks as he steps into the tub and lowers himself slowly into the hot water. 

She laughs and straddles one of his thighs even though there is enough room for her to actually sit down and lays her head against his chest. “Oh yeah,” she laughs and shivers when he drags his fingers up and down her spine. 

“You’re all oiled up,” he murmurs in almost reverence at the discovery. 

She laughs, “There’s some oil in the bath and I gave myself a massage earlier so I’m all nice and slick.” 

“ _Oh_?” he chuckles and lets his hand drop lower to cup her ass, “I could have done that for you. Massage you, I mean.” 

“I know,” she says and leans back to look at him and run her hands over his chest and shoulders, “but that means I have more time to massage you—after we scrub you clean that is. You do smell,” she wrinkles her nose as she leans close to get a whiff of him. Blood, sweat, and that mildew smell that they get after they visit Crestwood is the first thing she can pick out and there’s _other_  smells—she even catches a hint of _herself_ —that she can pick out and doesn’t really want to think to hard about. 

She gets off of him and leans over the edge of the tub to grab some of the soaps and cloths. “You’re going to smell so good,” she murmurs when she presses the soap up against her nose. 

“I can bathe myself,” he protests when she starts lathering up the cloths.

“Obviously you can’t, otherwise I wouldn’t have had people write complaint letters to me,” she snorts and motions for him to turn around, and with some difficult maneuvering, he does. 

He chuckles, “Heh, I was wondering how long it would take. Let me guess: Dorian, Josephine, and Vivienne?” 

“Yep,” she hums and begins washing his back and neck and probably puts a little more than needed force into scrubbing. As long as it gets him clean, she doesn’t care. He doesn’t seem to either as he lets out small moans. She laughs, “I haven’t even started with the massage yet.” 

“Kadan, anything you do is great,” he moans and then raises a hand up, “Lather me up, I’ll get my front.”

She happily hands him a cloth—there’s a lot of him to wash and they’re going to be at it a while. It does take a while even with both of them scrubbing so thoroughly, and she works down his huge back, down to his ass, and she makes him stand up so she can do his legs. She feels as though it must have at least been an hour later when they're done and he sinks back into the tub with a sigh, sloshing some of the water out of it.

Ariala is about to fall back down into his arms again when she realizes the gift she got him last month was still in one of her drawers. Even as she steps out of the tub, even before it happens, she realizes she made a mistake. The oil has slicked the tub and thus her stepping out causes her to lose footing. She slips and falls out of the tub, of course not without jamming her knees into the side first and barely being able to catch herself before she hits the cold, stone floor. 

“ _Andraste's_ _fuck_ ,” she hisses and belatedly realizes Bull definitely did try to catch her—and ended up splashing water all over the floor—but was much too slow and now is just staring at her on the floor.

A grin crosses his face and mixes equally with the concern, “Need any help, Kadan?” 

She makes a noncommittal noise and picks her self off the floor. It takes her not that long to search through her drawer for the jar of balm that nearly killed her. Bull offers her a hand when she makes it back to the tub and she graciously accepts it. “You’re a god,” he tells her when he realizes what she has in her hands. 

“Go on,” she prompts and stays standing to rub the horn balm on him. Also, this way, her breasts are right in his face as a nice little bonus. The balm is a weird, thick consistency on her fingers and she starts rubbing it into the base of his horns and then moves up. 

“Your ass is great.”

“Obviously.”

“Your thighs are fucking awesome and _thick_." 

“I work hard for these nice of thighs.” 

“And then your tits—“ 

“Nothing about how pretty I am?” 

“Your tits are pretty?” 

She laughs and pushes them in his face as she reaches for the tip of his horn and then goes to work on the other. His breath stutters, though, and he grips her hips and pushes her a bit away from him. “What—?” she questions when his hand comes up to grip her breast and just _looks_ at it.

His thumb traces over her nipple and a shiver curls down her spine and then he looks up at her. “Do you have nipple piercings?” 

It’s then that she can see the closed hole that he’s looking at, “Yeah, but the hole is closed. I got them a couple years ago when I was traveling through Rivain. I took them out because my brother saw them once through my shirt and threatened to tell my mother."

The last tip of his horn is covered in the balm and she steps back and reaches for a cloth to wipe off her hands before she settles back down on his lap. He’s thinking, she can tell; something she said doesn’t add up to him, so she waits for him to ask. After a second, his hand reaches up and touches right underneath her left eye and instantly she understands. “How’d she react to this then?” 

Ariala is quiet for a minute—she remembers her mother crying when she saw her for the first time with the faded tattoo. How she just cupped her face and cried, how her father held her so tightly for the first time in months. Her brother barely being able to get out what happened. The anger came later.

“Never said anything—just hit me and the next day there was make up on my dresser to cover it up.” 

The hand on her hip tightens just a bit, and she recognizes the subtle, controlled anger slipping onto his face, so she kisses him. His lips are hard for a second but then they respond, opening up for a deeper kiss. It’s only when she gets him to take in a sharp intake of breath that she backs off with a small smile. 

Her hand that was curled around his jaw travels up until it touches the small band of leather, “Oh, we didn’t wash this.” He gives her a small nod that it’s okay for her to remove it and she undoes the eyepatch. Even though she did not mind it, Bull still was self conscience of the missing eye and scarred tissue, and many times during the beginning of their relationship he kept it on. A sort of sore spot for many reasons that she doesn’t prod on but she still guesses. 

Ariala rings out a cloth and gently cleans the scarred tissue, not pushing hard anywhere in case the area is still sensitive. 

“I love you,” he says. 

A warmth spreads through her and she drops down into his lap again and holds herself against him with her arms around his neck. “I love you more,” she tells him in between pecks to his jaw. 

He chuckles at that, “It’s not a competition—"

“You only say that ‘cause you’re losing,” she cuts him off with a grin. 

“Nu uh,” he then presses forward until he dunks her underwater and pulls her back up, “Admit that I love you more.” 

“Now, Bull, I’ve been reading Dorian’s—“ he dunks her, “— _anyway_ , relationship advice books and lying is definitely bad for the relationship.” 

“Oh, sure, like _that_ wasn’t a lie. Say it, Kadan.” 

“Say what?"

“That I love you more.” 

“I love you more.” 

“Oh!” he grunts and dunks her again, this time she sputters a bit with some water up her nose. “Say that I, the Iron Bull, loves you, Ariala Trevelyan, more.” 

“Well, I, Ariala Bellona Amaris Trevelyan the Inquisitor, loves you, the Iron Bull the mercenary Tal-Vasoth, more. I love you more than all of the stars and the moons in the sky and more than all of the world— _I_ love you, more.” 

Oh, the blush on his face after that is downright precious and Ariala grins at her prize for winning. Bull doesn’t even pout a bit and just grins back, “That was the cheesiest thing I’ve ever heard, Kadan.” 

“Me and my mom used to go back and forth for nearly thirty minutes until I fell asleep when I was little,” she admits and leans up to press kisses to the underside of his jaw. The stubble there tickles her and she considers asking him if he trusted her to help him shave, but then again _she_  doesn’t trust herself to help him. Also, Bull was going to get spoiled with all of this pampering. 

He picked her up and stood up from the tub. He gently stepped out so that not to make the same mistake as Ariala and walked to the bed, “Well, Kadan, I love you _the most_.” 

 

**Author's Note:**

> truth is bull actually slipped but caught himself at the cost of dropping ariala and the mood was totally ruined
> 
> also it's very important to understand that ariala is a liar and it's a mystery if bull has ever caught her yet (or how many times) because he hasn't called her out yet (and isn't sure he will because he thinks she lies to feel more comfortable)


End file.
